The association between health anxiety, physical disease and cardiovascular risk factors in the general population – a cross-sectional analysis from the Tromsø study: Tromsø 7

BACKGROUND: Health anxiety (HA) is defined as a worry of disease. An association between HA and mental illness has been reported, but few have looked at the association between HA and physical disease. OBJECTIVE: To examine the association between HA and number of diseases, different disease categories and cardiovascular risk factors in a large sample of the general population. METHODS: This study used cross-sectional data from 18,432 participants aged 40 years or older in the seventh survey of the Tromsø study. HA was measured using a revised version of the Whiteley Index-6 (WI-6-R). Participants reported previous and current status regarding a variety of different diseases. We performed exponential regression analyses looking at the independent variables 1) number of diseases, 2) disease category (cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes or kidney disease, respiratory disease, rheumatism, and migraine), and 3) cardiovascular risk factors (high blood pressure or use of cholesterol- or blood pressure lowering medication). RESULTS: Compared to the healthy reference group, number of diseases, different disease categories, and cardiovascular risk factors were consistently associated with higher HA scores. Most previous diseases were also significantly associated with increased HA score. People with current cancer, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes or kidney disease had the highest HA scores, being 109, 50, and 60% higher than the reference group, respectively. CONCLUSION: In our general adult population, we found consistent associations between HA, as a continuous measure, and physical disease, all disease categories measured and cardiovascular risk factors. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12875-022-01749-0.